TomCruise48

17 minutes ago, CruisingAgain said:

But I don't understand one thing mentioned here .... what does it matter if it gives you 1 or 2 cruises? 

Milestone rewards are based on number of cruises (25, 50, 75, and 100), not number of cruise days.

We have done both.  One thing we like about back to back is that on a single cruise, you can't take in all of the entertainment.  On a back to back, we are able to see all of the Playlist shows and Dive-in movies that interest us.  On a 14 day Journeys cruise, you get to know the staff and other passengers better.  Also the Journeys cruises have many additional activities such as Academy of Fun lectures and ballroom dancing classes.

We always fly to the port, so we often try to get two or three cruises from one flight.  We also do side-to-side, where we change to another Carnival ship, or a ship on another line.  

We have three cruises in a row scheduled for later this year from the same port.  The first is on RCCL, followed by two short B2B cruises on a Carnival Fantasy class ship.  We haven't been on a Fantasy class for more than 10 years, and want to see the 2.0 upgrades on this class.  We also need a couple more cruises to make the next milestone level on Carnival to use on a 16 day TA next year.

1 hour ago, Cherrys said:

Lee Mason confirmed to me on Facebook last week that he will be CD In June. I’ve never cruised with him but he seems fun!

I think the Lee is the best of the current Carnival CD's.  He's quite engaging and appeals to a wide demographic.  Unlike many other CD's, he's not full of himself.

We had him on a 14 day Hawaii Journeys cruise last year and had multiple occasions to interact with him.  I'm sure that he had a busy schedule, but always took time to have meaningful conversations with us.

He's very quick witted.  Make sure that you go to all of his morning shows.

We showed our appreciation for him by making a significant contribution to St. Jude while on board.

I'll think that Carnival will need to double the size of their lost and found property room to hold all of the items that were stored inside the footstool and forgotten on departure. 

Looks like the showers are similar to those on RCCL Oasis Class ships.  Love the  RCCL design where the glass shower doors extend almost all the way to the ceiling and the exhaust duct is over the shower.  With this design, the bathroom mirror does not fog up when you use the shower.

Platinum Diamond reunion is held on sailings of 5 days or more.  Diamond event with captain is held on all cruises, regardless of length,  if there are Diamond guests on board.

On the Horizon in January, we were told by server that 2 appetizers and 1 entree was included. 

See:

https://help.carnival.com/ci/fattach/get/4135658/1547821219/redirect/1/filename/Ship Class Guide 0119.pdf

Carnival Ship Class Guide 0119.pdf

No single answer to this question.  The newer ships such as Vista and Horizon have a fairly good selection of on-demand movies, most free, but a few for a charge, that work as you describe.  There are no on demand TV shows.  Older ships have a few movies that play on a loop and are not on demand.  Carnival recently changed their live TV offerings to include HGTV, Food Network, CBS News, and some children's' channels - a slight improvement to their previously very poor lineup.

Vista and Horizon also have IMAX theaters, that depending on what has just been released that week, have some great movies.  We recently saw Aquaman in 3D on the Horizon ($10 for seniors) and it was fantastic.

Biggest difference that we notice is that staff and crew on Carnival are more friendly and engaging.  On Carnival, stateroom stewards and dining room servers will almost always address you by your first name.  CCL entertainment staff is much more approachable and want to engage with guests.

2 hours ago, tom3562 said:

anyone know what nights on the 6 day?

Monday and Wednesday on last week's 6 day.

Port of Miami is not pedestrian friendly.  We take a taxi between ships.  The taxi drivers are not happy about about waiting in line for such a short trip. We compensate with a large tip.

34 minutes ago, jimbo5544 said:

Coming from an area which already adopted no plastic straws, I can tell you paper straws suck.... no pun intended.

When I was growing up, all we had we're paper staws.

43 minutes ago, xDisconnections said:

Thankfully they’re still available upon request for those who want one.

 

What’s the straw situation like on Royal Caribbean? Haven’t ventured over to that board yet.

On RCCL right now. They are using paper straws.

Typical of Carnival, the rules seem to be different depending on who you talk to at Carnival.  In early December I transferred 2 cruises to my TA by simply sending her the booking numbers.  Later on that month I tried to do the same thing and Carnival rep said that I had to set up PIN's on the cruises and give my TA the PIN's as well as the booking number. 

Ordered 5x$500 Tuesday night and they arrived Thursday morning.  We are only one state away from where they are shipped.  You can sign up on UPS app to waive the need for a signature and specify where driver should place the envelope.  The app will send a notification as soon as they are delivered. 

What I have observed at assigned dining is that the wait team typically serves 4 to 6 tables depending on table size.  They will often start taking orders at the first table that is full.  The table that is still waiting for guests to arrive usually has their order taken last. 

It is more efficient for the waiters to make only one trip to the galley per table per course.  There are different lines in the galley for the appetizers, main courses, and deserts.  If they are serving a mixture of courses to a given table because some guests were late to arrive, it slows them down because they need to go through multiple lines in the galley.  

As a courtesy to both the waiters and other guests, we always try to let both the waiters and other guests know if we do not plan to eat in the MDR on a given night.  

One thing I forgot to mention is the Dive-in movies.  Since this was a long cruise, most, but not all, were shown on two different nights on the December Hawaii cruise.  The Splendor has a retractable dome that can cover the main pool area on Deck 9, so weather was not a factor for watching movies.

2 minutes ago, shof515 said:

I am surprised they have a private party event listed in the funtimes. whenever i was on the ship, it was never in the funtimes. they was only a card in my room with the date/time and location

We did get invitation cards and it was posted in the Funtimes (but not in the Hub app).  I had talked to a CD about this on a previous cruise.  He explained that they were asked to continue posting it in the Funtimes since when the M&M's were first set up with Carnival, there was no way for Carnival to know who had signed up.  CC later modified their signup procedure to include that information so Carnival could send invitations.  The post in the Funtimes was the only way to notify those who had signed up under the initial procedure.  

It has probably been about two years since the procedure was modified, so it is likely that the M&M's for all those who signed up under the initial procedure have passed and Carnival can stop posting the event in the Funtimes.

Just took this same cruise earlier this month.  In addition to what fyree39 mentioned, there will be a guest lecturer with 5 different lecture topics, a naturalist (hopefully the wonderful Nancy) who will explain the natural wonders of Hawaii with many presentations, and ballroom dance instructors.  There will be more fly-on entertainers for evening entertainment.  There will be 8 comedians total for the Punchliner, each presenting one family and two different adult shows.

The current staff on the Splendor is fantastic.  The CD, Lee Mason, is the most engaging and sincere CD that we have encountered in 40+ cruises.  Be sure to go to all of his Morning Shows.  Spenser, the ED is unlike most any other Entertainment Director.  He is highly visible and loves to engage with the guests.  Lars, the Hotel Director, is always around making certain that guests have the best possible experience.

We attended a CC Meet and Mingle on a recent Carnival cruise.  We were pleasantly surprised to be greeted by the CD, ED, and Hotel Director at this event.  The event started out great, but about 15 minutes into it, a couple who were not CC members ignored the Private Function sign by the door and walked in.  The husband had seen the event scheduled in the Funtimes and thought this was the place to take his complaints.  The Carnival staff did an excellent job of explaining the function of the Meet and Mingle and Cruise Critic to the couple.  The wife then recognized that this was a private function and tried to get her husband to leave, but he had three senior officers cornered and wanted to air his list of complaints.

Most of the rest of the event was spent listening to this non-CC member complain about things that Carnival does or does not do.  Many of his complaints were petty, such as the hole that Carnival punches in the S&S card is not big enough.  Other complaints were about things that almost all cruise lines do.

His monopolizing of the conversation pretty much ruined the event for CC members.  The Carnival staff handled this professionally and patiently listened to the man’s complaints and tried to explain why things are done the way they are.  I felt sorry for the staff and can understand why most times the M&M’s are not attended by anyone from Carnival.

Had the words “Cruise Critic” had not appeared in the Funtimes, this would likely never have happened.  I cannot help but think that the name of our group casts a bad light on the organization.

On our cruise earlier this month there were about 600 Platinum + Diamond.  They ran out of the bags and handed out letters to those who did not get a gift to allow them to pick one up when they disembarked.  The guests who did not receive a gift on the ship received blankets when they presented their letters.  The blankets are the newest gift. 

1 hour ago, ABQrobin said:

Sad to see Malcolm Woohoo Burns is gone.  Loved him.

I see that Shwartz is doing a short stint on the Horizon...does that mean he is going to be on one of the newest ships next year?  He is awesome, too.

 

 

Last we heard about Malcolm (3 weeks ago) is that he is on medical leave recovering from surgery and doing well.

Last word that we heard about Malcolm (3 weeks ago) is that he is on medical leave recovering from surgery and doing well.  MarQ is the current CD on the Magic, but is scheduled to sign off on 3/1/2019.

Carnival shares the round trip Barbados cruise with the round trip San Juan cruise, but a majority of the guests on the ship will embark in San Juan.  The cruise from San Juan typically runs from Sunday to Sunday, while the Barbados cruise runs Wednesday to Wednesday.  If you are on a cruise from San Juan that overlaps with a cruise from Barbados, there will be a group of guests disembarking in Barbados on Wednesday and possibly a new group embarking the same day.  When the cruise reaches San Juan, the Barbados guests disembark as in-transit guests and have priority to re-embark.

With two different Barbados cruises overlapping with a San Juan cruise, it is likely difficult for the Maitre D to accommodate the Barbados guests at assigned dining.